The program promotes a broad conception of bioethics encompassing both medical and environmental ethics, drawing on courses as well on faculty affiliates and programs in the schools of Medicine, Law, Education, Environmental Studies, and Public Service.

Students may choose to follow a health track or an environment track but in both cases they will receive training in a broader bioethics whose theories and applications encompass life in all its forms.

Ph.D. students specializing in animal, environmental, and food ethics are encouraged to complete a master’s degree in another field. For instance, a student specializing in environmental ethics might take a master’s in Wildlife and Fisheries Sciences with an emphasis in ecology, or a master’s in Political Science emphasizing environmental politics and regulation.

The Graduate Environmental Ethics Certificate was designed primarily to provide an additional credential to enhance professional development. It currently enrolls 20 graduate students, and was the first certificate program of its kind in the United States, began in 1983.

The University of Montana also hosts the Environmental Writing Institute and the Mansfield Ethics and Public Affairs Program (formerly known as the Center for Ethics).

Students are required to take three credits in an internship or field course which can be fulfilled by participating as an assistant in a three-week Wild Rockies Field Institute course in one of Montana’s natural areas.

The philosophy department at UNT is the home of the first journal in the field, Environmental Ethics (founded 1979), as well as the Center for Environmental Philosophy.

The department pursues a number of research projects focusing on the broad issues of environmental concern—OMORA, The Water Program, Center for the Study of Interdisciplinarity, The Philosophy of Food Project, and the Environmental Justice Project.

Each spring, students in the program attend the Idaho/Montana Graduate Student Conference in Environmental Philosophy and have the opportunity to present a paper before peers and select faculty from the two universities.

The program employs an educational approach that fosters analytical skills, leading to an in-depth understanding of the complex relationships among natural science, law, and management. Students gain the ability to use the tools of these disciplines to develop appropriate responses to complex environmental issues.

Students completing this program will be prepared to think globally and address environmental problems facing our planet using cutting-edge technology and research that is fueling national and international policy.

"Talk of mysteries! Think of our life in nature — daily to be shown matter, to come in contact with it — rocks, trees, wind on our cheeks! the solid earth! the actual world! the common sense! Contact! Contact! Who are we? Where are we?" —Henry David Thoreau